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SBRT studies show positive results for lung cancer in elderly and prostate cancer

by Thomas Dworetzky, Contributing Reporter | September 27, 2016
Rad Oncology Radiation Therapy
A pair of studies show positive results for stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT), highlighted by improved survival rates for elderly patients with early stage lung cancer and high cancer control and low toxicity in fewer treatments for prostate cancer, according to presentations at the 58th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO).

For the epidemiological lung cancer study, 62,213 records of those over age 60 with stage I NSCLC between 2004 and 2012 were analyzed. The records came from the National Cancer Institute’s Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database.

Survival rates for SBRT “rose dramatically,” the researchers noted in a statement. The rise tracked the adoption of SBRT during the years 2004 to 2012. Overall survival rate at 23 months post SBRT was up from 39 to 58 percent.

“Our findings indicate that physicians should feel confident recommending radiation therapy to patients who are too sick to undergo surgery or who choose not to undergo surgery for other reasons,” said Dr. Andrew M. Farach, a radiation oncologist at Houston Methodist Hospital and lead author on the study. “With continued adoption of SBRT in community cancer centers, it is our hope that more patients will receive curative SBRT, and the number of patients left untreated based on age or medical comorbidity will continue to fall.”

He recommended that although surgery still has the highest survival rate, “this study demonstrates both clear benefits from SBRT for nonsurgical NSCLC patients and that outcomes following radiation therapy have improved at a more accelerated pace over the past decade than those for any other therapeutic approach.”

SBRT was also the focus of another study, the first large, multi-institutional examination of its use in prostate cancer with long-term follow-up.

“Single-institution studies on the use of SBRT as the primary treatment for prostate cancer have illuminated the treatment as a cost-effective and faster alternative to IMRT [intensity-modulated radiation therapy],” said Dr. Robert Meier, lead author of the study and a radiation oncologist at Swedish Medical Center in Seattle, addressing the audience at the ASTRO annual meeting. “Our study is the first to contribute multi-center data that support the use of SBRT as front-line therapy for men with prostate cancer.”

Over 300 men with newly-diagnosed cancer took part in the trial at 21 different institutions nationwide.

“In the low-risk group,” according to researchers, “the five-year relapse-free survival rate was 97.3 percent, and less than two percent of patients had any “serious side effects” five years post SBRT.

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